Thursday, August 9, 2012

What Went Wrong: This game was a complete mess from a strategic standpoint. I'll get into the pitching side shortly, but it really started when Jim Tracy posted his lineup card and it didn't include Carlos Gonzalez. In his career against Wednesday's opposing starter Chad Billingsley, Gonzalez was 10-for-18 with four walks. If you're going to schedule a routine day off for your best player, I wouldn't suggest doing it against a guy he's that locked in against, regardless of the sample size.

Maybe there's something I'm missing and he needed the day off (or maybe Tracy is just married to the two days in a row off thing). I don't know.

With CarGo out of the lineup, Tyler Colvin shifted to the outfield and Matt McBride returned to the lineup. He would proceed to have perhaps the worst game ever for a Colorado first baseman. At the plate, he was 0-for-4 with two strikeouts and two popouts (one that failed to advance a runner). That's bad enough.

In the field, he dropped a 1st inning popfly, which extended the inning for Jeff Francis. That's significant when there's a pitch limit in play, and it proved to very significant as this one played out. Later, McBride couldn't handle a throw from Jordan Pacheco that resulted in Pacheco being charged with an error. The throw was definitely high, but it had to be caught. No excuse.